Summer On Fire
by Sara Darkotter
Summary: He picks her up off the floor and her eyes are summer on fire, and he? He's in love and doesn't realize.


Really, this is just an epically long free-form/verse poem, but don't tell my old writing teacher that, she'll say it isn't.

* * *

They meet.

And she's crying and looking around fearfully because her brother isn't there and her knees are bright red after a fall and nobody else moves because they're scared to touch the Potter girl.

And all he says is, "Here," and helps her up walks her silently to the infirmary where's she's all fixed in a matter of seconds and they're heading to class with excuse notes she doesn't need and that he doesn't get noticed. And even though he's green and she's scarlet and he's two years above her, they're okay with each others silent company because she's gets too many questions about her parents and brothers and he gets too many snide remarks cold looks rhetoric insults.

And then he whispers a goodbye when she's safe in her class and wanders a path to his own because nobody truthfully cares if he shows up, he's hated anyway. His House has some understanding but they can walk out in public just fine as long as they keep their head down. He can't. Because he was born with silver-blond hair and grey eyes and sharp angled features and a name no one looks past.

When he enters the History class his teacher who replaced the ghost narrows her eyes but for once glances at the note and he sits down and the only seat left is the one left next to Albus the Slytherin Potter. And the boy blinks green eyes but there's no harsh comment that had made Scorpius avoid him since day one two years ago. Because he's an odd one out too and the entire school doesn't know how to treat him because he's a Potter but he's a Slytherin so is he good or evil they don't know and they're confused. And confusion and fear are best friends so Scorpius keeps getting hexed and jinxed and he's had enough already and it's been twenty one years since the Second Wizarding War but no one got the message.

And so he stands up strong and takes blows for his entire House and defends first-years by drawing student attention when they make common first-year mistakes and so he takes their hexes and jinxes and ridicule and even fists and when they're later crying and helping him heal because he won't go to the infirmary on days when Madam Pomfrey isn't there he knows it's worth it seeing they're unmarked faces and gratitude. Because for Houses that are supposed to be the good guys Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, and Ravenclaw sure know how to hold grudges and spread anger.

And then the next day in the library she sits next to him and though she doesn't say anything he knows she's grateful just for that action. And though the students hiss and glare and send flying threatening notes, he doesn't care because she just looks like another grateful first-year to him.

And he notices it looks like she might have fallen again and frowns but says nothing because maybe she's just clumsy and she's hiding bandaged elbows in shame.

And then a few weeks pass and he realizes that she isn't clumsy it's three girls in his own House taking out their own anger and pain on her and he's terrified for the what might to his younger Housemates because of them and he tells them in front of his entire house the first time one girl comes to him with a broken nose and a fear of the infirmary because that's where she got punched by Molly Weasley of all Gryffindor girls.

And outside their House entrance is Lily waiting and the first thing she does is apologize with tears to the girl and beg that she forgives her that she got hurt because of her own injuries and the entire House doesn't know what to do because no one ever apologized to them and the three girls are shamed even more and finally Albus steps forward and hugs his little sister and tells her that it's no one's fault.

But he knows she doesn't believe him because she sat next to him in the library and tells him so and it's the first time they ever talk and it's amazing because she's so bright and thoughtful and has traits seen only in Luna Lovegood her godmother and Lily is the most amazing first year he's ever met.

And things get worse for him because now he's working double and then triple-time and then it's all up in air for his first-years and only now does the Headmistress catch on when he ends up in the infirmary with half his ribs shattered and an eye stabbed through and spelled by a wand and a broken leg and arm and heavily bruised throat and there's so little Madam Pomfrey can do because he's been like this for nearly twenty-four hours when Peeves found him curled up half-drowned and body burned because after he'd been weighted down on his limbs and neck so that when that night's storm flooded the lake he'd drown and he's already half-drowned by the time he's found and he doesn't care that Peeves is out of his castle or that he announced him by screaming "MURDER! MURDER BY THE LAKE! THIRD-YEAR MALFOY DEAD BY THE LAKE!" because he saved him and the first person who came running was a little first-year named Lily and she's actually scared for him.

But there's nothing that can be done for the eye because not only had it been twenty-four hours but someone used a spell on it so that when in the presence of water it hurts like hell and it takes too long to find this out.

So the aurors come in and he doesn't think they'll try to hard to find the culprits he won't name especially since Harry Potter is leading the crew but he tries the hardest and doesn't even care when he put a seventh-year and two sixth-years in chains and sends them to Azkaban for assault and attempted murder. He doesn't care that one of them is a Gryffindor he just growls in his face that he isn't worthy to even speak such a name and he had better get on his hands and knees and lick Scorpius's shoes because that's the closest he'll ever come to being a true Hogwarts student.

And then another auror makes him and Scorpius is just relearning how to walk all over again leaning on a staff because canes are stupid and you can use staffs for defense and this is the best memory he has of that entire event except Lily visiting the infirmary and asking for help on homework because that's so normal and later he would realize that's why she did it.

"You have a strong son, Malfoy," Ron Weasley says and he pretends that being complimented by a Weasley doesn't make him feel prouder or higher because come on it's just a person!

And when he finally steps out of the infirmary for the first time in months leaning heavily on a staff his height and then some and limping surrounded by his House he knows that in this age, it will be Slytherins, not Gryffindors, that will be the bravest House.

He let's this slip to Lily that day when they meet in the library like nothing's happened and he corrects her Potions homework marveling at his working hand and she agrees completely.

And the year passes and he goes home and suddenly when he limps around in public people duck their heads in shame because the _Prophet_ published a completely accurate story for once of what happened and why and now no one knows what to do because they were wrong and they caused this.

His grandparents who had never been proud of him before and tended to ignore him are so proud and are always trying to help him and Grandfather even says he'd try to be a governor for Hogwarts again just to make sure that he and his classmates get treated more fairly and he just grins and says he doesn't have to go that far because he's got it covered now and all they do is laugh and he laughs too though it hurts his throat. He's never heard his family laugh and all at once the house is alive.

And his family loves him.

§•§

He goes back to school.

And at the station people whisper and point but it's not bad anymore and he sees Lily and she hugs him in front of everyone. And he smiles and doesn't care as he places a gloved hand covered in burn scars on her head because House doesn't matter to him if they leave his younger Housemates alone and Lily does.

And Lily apologizes quietly that he got hurt and his father hides shock and tears that the youngest Potter is such a forgiving self-blaming soul.

And they get onto the train together and James Potter who has never spoken to Scorpius a day in his life except to thank him for helping his sister sits next to him during the train ride and again he enjoys the quiet between them because the Potter siblings all realize what a blessing silence can be.

And then Lily in her pink bow grumps that James never sent her a toilet seat in his first year and they all laugh and James says he'll help her prank a different cabin and now he hears the delicate yet speedy work that goes into a Marauder prank and he even helps and that's the first time a Potter prank is subtle and no evidence points to anyone and now he's suddenly a friend with the most famous and well-loved people in school and no one touches the young Slytherins anymore because James gets in on prevention and that was the best part of the entire year was every day seeing their faces and knowing his House-his brothers and sisters-were safe.

Or safer because nothing ever quite cools but this is enough. This is enough for him. It was enough to comfort a trying-to-be-tough second-year over words instead of bruises.

And Lily is his friend though he's two grades above because really he's less than eleven months older and it's nice to correct her homework and hear her insight on his own and nobody can deny her intelligence and deep thinking but he can't figure out why sometimes she'll turn red and cover her scroll or notes when it looks like she hasn't done much work and he leans over to see what's distracting her.

And the holidays roll around and he's just going to stay at school because his parents found out his mother is pregnant with the first younger child to be born to the Malfoy name in nearly six generations but then Lily invites him to her home and it's a home because it's bright and packed for the holidays and something's always happening even if it's only that you might walk in on someone snogging if you don't knock first and everything suddenly becomes a obstacle course for his blind eye but he doesn't care and instead laughs when he trips yet again and though the Weasleys had been determined to be cold and hate him by the third day he's sucked up into everything and even gets to be part of the Weasley-Potter clan Quidditch tournaments.

The Potters usually have to pull in friends of the family to fill their team because they're so small but they love it anyway and somehow drawing straws Scorpius finds himself Seeker and Harry Potter has to play Keeper again for the second year in a row and his green eyes sparkle as he tells Scorpius a few tips to see the snitch with only one working eye and for the first time in four years (A long-standing joke) the Potters win the games and he walks away with a bruised shin and the nickname of Freefall and he loves it.

And Lily, for whom this was her first time actually participating pouts that she wanted to be Seeker, but then suddenly hugs him saying that he'll do and this family is the best because his family barely even glances at Quidditch scores in the paper when it's a slow day.

And then he watches the Captains Quidditch game and Ginny as the Potter captain is the Seeker for the Green team because tradition had the two teams being Christmas-themed colors and they game began at midnight of the new year and Scorpius risked the pain and cheered in a voice loud enough to hear and the constant taste of blood in his mouth whenever he coughed afterwards was so worth it because they won and Green joked that it must be the two Slytherins in the crowd that did it.

So the other team wants to play again and change their name to Scarlet but now it's seven in the morning so they go inside for hot drinks and biscuits and sleep.

And then he wakes up at five in the afternoon and he and Lily talk on the couch with the last of the tea in the home and she keeps waving a hand over his head at something and then mutters blushing about a nagle but it isn't until James comes in and laughs that he remembers why he's avoided this side of this couch completely because the Potters don't apparently believe in taking down holiday decoration until they absolutely have to so the mistletoe above his head probably won't come down till Easter and now Lily's bright red as James teases them and suddenly just tells them to get it over with.

Luna comes by then and says that a nargle is sitting on his head as he feels some odd weight settle on his hair and Lily kisses him out of nowhere and the weight disappears.

And there's the small click of a camera and Scorpius knows this is going to get around school faster than Albus's pet ferret on caffeine.

And once the cackling elder brother walks off, Scorpius puts his head in hands and asks, "Why did you let me sit there so long?"

And he knows she's blushing deep Weasley purple as she answers. "I thought you knew and were..." The sentence hangs but he can finish it just fine in his head and he thinks he's almost going to blush red-purple himself but his face settles for pink. The decorated wide piece of cloth he ties across his eye for an eyepatch unties itself because apparently New Years is the day faeries actively work and the cloth flutters to the ground and in his blind eye something zooms across his vision to the extent the eye would have been able to see and suddenly vanishes when it reaches the area only his good eye can see and says, slowly, "What was that?"

"A burbwing," Luna says in a voice not quite attached to this world. "I'm surprised you saw it, Scorpius, most people don't. Unless they're family, or have permission."

"Family of what?"

Luna wanders away like she never heard putting earrings with large dangling feathers in her ears and watching the ceiling until she reaches the kitchen and turns to tell him something that drives a shiver up his spine.

"A burbwing is a helpful dead spirit that doesn't want to be a ghost because they're only helping one family till they join them. This one's name is Sirius, and the other's Hedwig. They were great friends of Harry."

He ties the cloth over his eye and pretends nothing happen but Lily gives him a sly smile and now they're keepers of a small but huge secret: They see what others can't.

§•§

They practice on the Astronomy Tower.

So Scorpius sits with his legs dangling over the edge and his eyepatch off and sees the colors of magic and the creatures few can see and Lily sits with him and does the same and they wonder about some of the things they spot. They see some people covered in a shine of bright and beautiful shades and some who only glow and some who don't have that light at all and it isn't until he spots two older Ravenclaws in may when he breaks from studying that he realizes because they see each other and the shine becomes stronger and he has to cover the blind eye to protect it because that shine he's been seeing is love.

And he tells this to Lily and the second year seems to brighten herself from admiration as she fawns over his ability and stares at the blind eye that is so faded that the iris is almost clear but really is a light light light grey and then she really does brighten in its sight as she smiles.

And he looks at the spirit of Sirius the dog protecting this girl and wonders what he did so nicely that Karma lets him sit in her presence and he almost thinks the dog agrees but then it turns to look at the view and he sees through it to see the Gryffindor boy glaring at him.

And he doesn't even know why.

§•§

Lily has eyes of a summer sky on fire. Blue outside and orange inside she says it was a trait she was born with and proud of because she has eyes like no one else at Hogwarts and no one can get her down about them.

But those eyes are so unusual everyone wants to look at them and Scorpius hates seeing this because some of those boys seem to get too close when looking but there's nothing he can do because they're only supposed to be study partners not friends and all he can do is watch and hope Albus is there to prevent anything because Lily isn't theirs to stand so close that there's only centimeters between their lips and he hates this so much he's been lashing out at others when he sees it. People don't know what to think so he passes it off as his eye since it's an unusually foggy May and so there's water everywhere outside and they couldn't do too much about the curse on it so instead of people ignoring him he has pity and a date to Hogsmead that weekend but that won't help because that means that Lily will be alone in Hogwarts with whatever boys stay behind and Scorpius _doesn't want that._

But he goes anyway but then when he starts to rain ending the infernal too-high temperatures and muggy air he's glad even though he's trying not to cry in pain because he gets to come back early without an excuse. And he leaves Amber the daughter of Parkinson and Zabini with barely an excuse because _Lily_.

But Amber doesn't mind because she just thinks he's in pain when he goes not to the infirmary but to the library and now he thinks he's just in time because that boy is too close though Lily's trying to lean back and she can't go any farther without tipping over and their lips touch and suddenly Scorpius doesn't feel his pain through the anger he pulls the two apart even as he tells himself that he shouldn't care. He excuses it when Lily hides behind and the boy realizes he's facing an older student then he armed with not only his wand but a staff and then he's gone.

And then Scorpius falls because the pain in his eye is too much and Lily sits next to him and holds him as she thanks him, peeling away the eyepatch and laying it out to dry on the table and now when he's crying on her shoulder feeling a sting with each tear Amber comes in and she looks at him as he stares back with one half-opened eye and then she slowly leaves and it was all over before it began.

But he doesn't mind because Lily held him and she was safe and that's all that matters so screw the rumors flying around she was his friend and she was there and even when his Quidditch team didn't win he didn't mind because Lily was sorry when he got off the field after playing backup because their Keeper was ill.

"At least you're not fourth."

"Yeah." He leaned on his broom while his staff waited with his things. "The Hufflepuffs don't win enough. They can have the cup this year."

She smiles and her eyes are summer on fire.

§•§

Summer is slow pain.

It's damp that eases into everywhere making nowhere pain-free and he has to grit his teeth and deal with it trying to save face in front of his family but privately he wants Lily here to hold him and he doesn't know why because he doesn't understand this new feeling inside himself. He hides in his bedroom decorated in green and silver and snakes so he can wear what he likes without people seeing his scarred arms and staring at his eye and limp. And he wonders wonders wonders when his owl comes in each night if it will have something for him because he heard some owls act of their own accord and it sounds nice to have a bird that feels for its owner and he cares for Albus's ferret Splash because she snuck into his bag on the last day and he couldn't return her because he never told his parents where he'd been this last Christmas and he wanted to stay in their kind but fenced hearts.

Then August comes round and then his mother is in bed for a day with a midwife and he can hear her crying and calling or he hears silence and worries but can't move so he crouches on his bed and watches odd things swim though an overlapping Sight.

The day ends and continues late into the night until his grandfather smoothly enters the room and says with a relieved and yet silky voice to come meet his little sister.

And he pads down carpeted hallways leaning on a dark-painted wall and nodding to the portraits who are smiling and then he enters the room and wishes he remembered his eyepatch because his mother _blazes_ with love for the blanket-wrapped bundle in his arm and he squeezes his eyes shut and opens them but it still hurts so he keeps his eyes down as he approaches till he's standing over the bed and it's a small face sleeping and she's lit in this way he's never seen that he can only describe as new...Because she is. He sits down and stares and she opens eyes not yet colored reflecting pink because she's only minutes old, and the two Malfoys stare at each other and then she suddenly glows because she knows. This is her brother and he'll always love her no matter what.

And the air fills with magic because there is nothing more magical than a newborn's firsts.

His father steps forward and he's trembling like he did when Scorpius was born because that's a new life he's responsible for bringing up and protecting and she's so frail but he picks her up anyway and she grabs a lock of hair that's hanging down from where he dug his fingers in his hair and pulled the Malfoy family hairstyle down and the room grins as she yanks. And another glow layers her because she loves this man who looks like her brother and who cares that Malfoys are supposed to hate? At birth they love unconditionally like any other and now mother takes her back and she doesn't just glow she shines because above all else she loves the woman who gave her life and breath and holds her now so gently till Grandfather, now able to move, shakily asks to hold her. And the man who remembers the last female Malfoy as only a great-great-grandmother who no longer remembered anyone held the youngest and maybe she knew how special she was to her family now because she smiles and the entire room paints itself in a beautiful new way only Scorpius can see but the others feel. A tear slipped down Grandfather's face but he smiled himself.

The midwife leaves smiling as she steps around the family house-elf who's trying to do seven things at once she's so excited but the woman doesn't realize how much this little girl meant to a family who hadn't had a second-born or a daughter in a forever only one of them vaguely remembered. All she knows is that the family in that room was so gentle, so normal she stopped outside to smile and think about how that could be odd before Apparating home.

§•§

September first rolls around and Scorpius limps the way into Kings Cross and then platform nine-and-three-quarters grinning even though his eye feels like it's on fire.

"Hey Score," Albus greets his Housemate and they board, shoving their luggage in the right compartment and waiting on the platform as they talked about their summers until Lily arrives and he suddenly wishes Albus would talk to someone else because he wants to tell her about his sister and what he saw to summer on fire eyes because they would understand the meaning.

And the train whistles and he's saved because they have to scramble aboard and luck gives the two an entire compartment to themselves which no one cares about because everyone knows they don't like each other that way or Albus would have "dealt with" Scorpius and he didn't.

And she gives him that wide-eyed shining look he likes but hates because it makes her look so childish and innocent and whispers she wishes she could see love like he did, but she said that she didn't, that she heard it like a note, one that rises pure in their voice.

"I hear it in yours," she whispers, "And it's especially beautiful."

Scorpius stammers and blushes and doesn't really know what to do because those words struck something in him and it's that feeling from the summer that he wanted her there but stronger. He looks out the window and spends hours watching the scenery pass in a dimensionless way because without his blind eye things appeared flat.

Except Lily.

Hogwarts draws close and suddenly she's the one stammering as she asks what she did wrong because the silence was all wrong and he smiles and said that she did nothing and she could do nothing wrong in his eyes but instead of smiling she flushes purple and looks down to mutter something he can't catch. He tilts her head with a gloved hand a moment and steps out to get a carriage and catches the fuzzy outlining of what ever pulls them as he adjusts the green fabric.

The one he manages to get has two girls and a prefect of all things and he rolls his eyes as one girl compliments the way his long hair looks down saying it made him look-but then she turned red.

The other girl finished that it's hot and they hope he keeps it but Scorpius ignores them in favor of the window. He hadn't forgotten what those particular girls tried to do to one of his first-years and he hadn't forgiven them and now they were rubbing in a style he'd discovered that summer as a means of covering a scar on his neck from the attack two years ago.

The prefect only asks him if he will need to see the infirmary when he arrives and he lies that he's fine because he's got to get used to the pain since his dormitory is below the lake and he'll be surrounded by the damp the entire year. They talk around him the entire drive until the gate looms and they cheer and even soft-voiced Scorpius manages something loud enough to qualify as "Outdoor" voice.

And he steps out and smiles at stars he hasn't seen in what feels like forever, leaning on a rune-carved staff that a professor wanted to borrow as an example on the first class of Ancient Runes that year and he'd agreed to even though he knew he'd be late to everything.

He limps to the Great Hall, ready for a new year.

§•§

Scorpius hated the new Defense teacher and he didn't have a rational reason because even as Teddy Lupin of the color-change hair admitted he didn't know how he got the job he taught them so much more than other teachers.

Their library time together Lily talked only of Teddy and how cute and amazing and sweet he was and how he was her godbrother and that she had once said when she was five that she was going to marry him only he was engaged to Victoire Weasley but she hoped anyway because he was...

And Scorpius would try not to growl and snap and wished she would talk about something else because somehow he just hated the idea that Lupin might hold Lily in his arms and whisper to her and comfort her and take her to his bed just...

He couldn't take it. He wanted nobody to have summer-on-fire Lily because he needed to have her always close because no one else understood what he saw and no one would love silence and no one pranked people and led on it was her brother and no one knew when his eye hurt that he couldn't hide it that her arms were all that helped him because they were all that ever held him.

But she glows as she speaks of Teddy and there's nothing he can do because he'd never cause her unhappiness by taking that glow so he listens and pretends a monster in him doesn't growl for Teddy's death and Lily all his to hold.

And Sirius almost seems to be laughing in his Sight when she starts going on again and he wishes he could just tell him to shut up already but he can't because Lily doesn't realize she has her ghostly protector and he meant for it to stay that way as he gave Scorpius so many warning looks.

So Scorpius does what every jealous boy who doesn't understand himself and can't ever get the chance and pretends nothing is stirring in himself when she looks at him and words he doesn't know are dancing on his tongue to be heard unbidden and he finds ways to distract himself.

She's a Slytherin and pretty and he's only talked to her twice but she likes him so he's told and he dates her. Library is passed up for snogging sessions in closets and empty classrooms and he holds her hand while pretending he feels something while wishing he could use his Sight to know if she did him because he's starting to not feel anything for anyone and he doesn't know why as he runs on automatic and ignores the eyes of Lily staring sad because now he feels nothing. He's frozen feelings and physical pain as he holds a girl he doesn't love and avoids the one that causes his heart to suddenly ache.

And the year passes and he never goes home once because he doesn't care enough to and then he's standing in his room trying to figure out what was wrong with him as his grandfather asks the same question and all he can say is that he doesn't know.

Then he opens the Sight for the first time in months and looks in a mirror and something is so wrong with him because he doesn't seem to have the same lighting as a regular person as if shadows were settling over his skin and he hides a cry and tries to escape as he finds his way to his sister's room and she looks at him.

Her eyes are silver in the Sight and it's the most beautiful silver he's ever seen because it shines and shimmers and she glows a little brighter when she sees him and all he's doing in leaning in the doorway.

And he trips and falls to his face before her and she laughs because she must think it silly to see a human like that and the air fills with the color of pure magic. A crystal chiming.

So now he won't leave her because how could he leave something so innocent and happy as her for nine months because he couldn't care enough to pack each time?

And he picks her up and uses silver-blond hair like his own to hide his tears and pain and she catches each droplet on her tiny baby hands and takes it away. She can't cure the pain of his eye like Lily summer-on-fire but she lessens it because she catches it in a baby's magic.

§•§

His OWLs come and they're all pass at least, and he passed well enough in certain one that if he chose he might be an auror like so many wanted to now because aurors were everything the people turned to as police and military and they were always working now because Voldemort's death didn't destroy darkness as spread it out so now they always work around the clock.

But he doesn't want to do anything except maybe work at some small corner of the Ministry or Hogwarts but his Grandfather says he should so he agrees.

He goes back to school and remembers at the station he forgot about his girlfriend and Lily both the entire summer and while Lily seems delighted that he's smiling slightly at the station his girlfriend isn't and declares that she doesn't love him anymore but now he knows she never quite did in the first places but he asks when she did anyway just so he can learn something.

She loved him best the months he was the coldest and most depressed and now he doesn't care she says she doesn't love him he ignores her as he helps a first year get his things on the train and Albus helps and at first she's smug but then she realizes that Scorpius isn't upset and slaps him in front of the entire station and his cheek burns but he doesn't care instead lifting the first year up after his stuff since he's too tiny to climb in himself. Then he eases himself in and Lily follows and they shut the train car door on her face and she stands there shocked because nothing seems to get him angry or jealous like she wanted.

Scorpius and Albus sit across and Lily curls up on the seat but she now ignores him as much as tries to get her to look at him because he needs her to because he's gone so long without the summer-on-fire gaze staring at him and he's almost dying without it.

Albus leaves to go to the prefect meeting and she suddenly grins and now his entire body relaxes because she still smiles.

"You deserved that," she says, then leaves with her blue-burning eyes and a smile and doesn't look back.

He breaks inside. Something important shattering and turning his heart into a thousand icy shards that she crushes so it can't be healed and he locks the cabin door and faces the window so he cry by himself and when he finally gets off the train he's beginning to freeze all over again.

§•§

He doesn't care anymore. He acts as normal as he can but others notice that the Slytherin Prince just isn't the same and though they try to help they can't and eventually just leave him be because there's nothing they can do. The Winter Ball rolls around and though he wishes for Lily he can't and watches a boy claim her and she smiles but her eyes don't flame like they should have and the glow is only barely visible and he's sure she's breaking herself too trying not to be friends, but she's stronger than him. He takes Amber and tries to find some emotion that night but can't until Lily sweeps up in a gold-and-red dress that hugs her curves and flatters her legs and asks.

"How do I look?"

"Fine," he whispers and she smiles and dances away with her date and he whines quietly because he feels something he doesn't understand and can't name but it can't be love because he doesn't glow or shine. But she won't be friends with him so they couldn't sit on the Astronomy Tower and talk and he can barely see Sirius padding after his charge anymore but all Scorpius can think of is that Lily is losing her Sight.

And he was losing her.

§•§

The last year and a half passes and summer is bliss as his sister reminds him as she grows about emotion and then he's an auror apprentice to Harry Potter himself and he shoves emotion away.

Then three summers after his sixth year an owl post from Lily arrives and he's trembling hoping as he sits in his room patching up cuts he barely feels anymore and rips it open but it's a wedding invitation and he feels a sudden rush of pain because he looks at the groom's name and there's no doubting he's a muggle and that meant Lily would be completely gone from him.

But he shows up that day and sees her and she's smiling wide and there's even a bit of summer-on-fire in her eyes and those shattered ice pieces are ground into dust because he peeks at her and she's blazing. It seems off but he knows that's because of his own pain and he looks at the shadows around himself in a mirror and makes a fist from a gloved hand because he'll never love her.

And the muggle is shaking his hand and gripping it too hard and talking excitedly and he feels the pureblood mantras from his early childhood and history classes rise to try to be spoken because he doesn't like this man and the pain he seemed willing to cause because Lily was trying to tell him that Scorpius had scars on his hands but he wouldn't listen.

And the ceremony comes and she turns to him right before and says, "How do I look?"

And he limps away to a seat because his tongue was glued down and his throat hurt and he was starting to realize what he might be feeling.

And they start and he suddenly realizes that what he felt was love and it was hidden under his shadows but there was nothing he could do because now it was years too late and she loved another and he stands up-

And limps out. He feels their eyes but he doesn't look up or he'll see Lily-summer and her gorgeous looks and he'll freeze.

He leaves his heart behind.

§•§

Firewhiskey. He downed an entire bottle of it in less than a night, simpering and crying moaning to himself and he couldn't believe that he'd been so stupid to lose Lily-summer-on-fire to a muggle of all things and that he never took the chance and then when the hangover rolled round he just found another bottle rather than face being sober but nothing seemed to wipe her image from his mind and it was too easy to take another mouthful and another and let it all go except that she wouldn't and then suddenly she was gone and he kept it up to keep her away.

And then he was being picked up from a sidewalk and it was his father and he was crying and whispering "Score, Score," and he hasn't been sober in two years and he's been missing for six months and he doesn't even know where he's been and his father is Apparating him home and putting him to bed and talking about things that didn't make sense like he did when Scorpius was six and got a dangerous fever and this is the first time he's truly slept since the night before the wedding and he wakes up to his little sister, who had to be seven now.

And her eyes are still silver in the Sight and he suddenly he's crying silently because she's still beautiful and glowing and he wasn't there for her like he should have been.

So cleans up and then barricades himself in his room to clean up his mind and at first he just sleeps because its so precious and in dreams there's a white moon owl guiding him through a dark forest and so when he wakes up he imagines this owl and thinks and thinks and Harry comes and visits with Albus and maybe they understand because Harry offers to let him finish his training when he's ready and Albus is actually there.

And it's been three months and he can stand up again and his family seems to be closer for it and he and his sister go places because she's never really been outside the manor and she's missed her brother and he's missed her too but Chione-silver-eyes glows much brighter than he does.

Sometimes late at night he goes for walks though and remembers Lily and wishes it were different but obviously she's happy and he'd never take that away from her but he walks because it beats drinking and he needs to keep his head clear because he's finishing his training.

But then he's walking much farther than usual even though it's snowing and his eye howls and he hears a bark from the side of his blind eye and uncovers it and there is an almost gone Sirius who then disappears because he's not strong enough. And he runs in that direction but sees nothing except neat houses and yards until he notices one has a strange rock except that it's not.

He jumps the low fence and looks at it and it's a woman in dark but thin clothes and gold-red hair and he gapes because it's Lily but it's not because she doesn't have the eyes and she's so desolate and thin and theres a bruise visible on her shoulder thanks to a low-hanging neckline.

"Are you one of his friends? I don't want to," she whispers, eyes teary and he snaps out of his staring.

"Who's friend? Who are you and why are you outside tonight of all things?"

"My husband's friends," she forces out. "They try to do things but I don't let them. He stops them, because he loves me and I don't deserve him but he loves me." She shivers and Scorpius lays aside his staff, easing off his coat and wrapping it around her.

"Why are you out here, if he loves you so much?" He tries to think of questions aurors ask victims.

"Because I misbehaved and I have to be punished for that. Please don't bother with this," she shoves the coat back though she doesn't want to with a quick movement. "I'll be fine, I don't get sick."

She had a wand strapped to her leg and it was a dark wood and the handle was well-carved and it had just the look of Lily's and it had to be.

"That, Lily, is because your magic is desperate enough to prevent it."

She gaped at him.

"I-I'm sorry! I'm sorry," she sobbed as if magic was a bad thing and she shouldn't be using it. "I'll-I'll stop!"

"Lily... Lily, what has done to you?" he asked in his voice soft as dust by a heavy strike years ago. Scorpius stands and tries to help her up but she's shaking her head at the snowy ground and crying and he just can't make himself and he has to be back soon or his father will worry that he's lapsed back to drinking but he can't leave her head and he growls and remembers all at once that he has an Apparating license and he says, "Look at me."

And she does and he remembers the muggle word, contact lenses and that's what's preventing her summer-on-fire eyes and he Apparates them both home to his room because it's the first place he could focus on but she lets out a cry and he's forced to speed-cast silence spells before his family hears.

"Tell me everything," he says in s voice that's gentle but leaves nothing to argument and she does and he hears about abuse she tries to pretend isn't so bad and threats she downtones and constant talking about how she loves her husband but he sees straight through because he sees Sirius isn't there and when he asks about her Sight she immediately starts talking about how stupid and childish it is and how it's just imagination and though he listens he's shaking his head so he crouches next to her and removes the contact lenses, telling her she'll see better this way.

But then she gives a fearful shout of no and the second thing out of her mouth is how her husband and indeed everyone hates her eyes and he glares at her.

Her mouth clips shut and he places a hand under her jaw as he whispers that she should have known he was lying-

And he kisses her and it's the most marvelous thing in the world even though she won't kiss back and her lips are chapped beyond belief but he holds it until she shoves him away with a Weasley blush.

But all he can do is grin because he kissed her and she's blushing like they were students all over again and maybe even she feels a little okay because she grins and she lights up and her eyes flicker with a match-flame of summer-on-fire.

But the clock on the wall shows it's early and she panics and nearly screams because she HAS to be back before seven when he lets her in or she spends another night outside and all he can do is hold her so she won't go and she does is go on and on about why she had to and if he was a full-fledged auror he could press charges and get muggle police involved but all he does is memorize it so he can tell his mentor later when the door opens.

And all his father sees is him hugging some scantily dressed girl because now she's only whispering with a voice rubbed raw and he can barely start to speak before he's being accused of drinking again but he hasn't and it's obvious to anyone who stops and looks a moment and it isn't until she turns to look at the older man before he stops in mid-sentence.

And now there's lighting enough to see bruises she's tried to hide under muggle make-up but it's smudged and his father says nothing till he slowly exits the room with a word about his mentor and then suddenly things blur over and Lily's sitting in Harry's office and Harry can't speak and a different auror has to question her but she won't speak she only clings to Scorpius so he tells what he heard and suddenly there's the muggle police and the man is being arrested and shouting threats at Lily but she doesn't listen.

She smiles at the sky and her eyes blaze at the match-flame catches.

So he leans over to see why and then it doesn't matter the looks he's getting or that she's a Potter and he's a Malfoy because all that matters it that it feels right to kiss her and feel her respond and nothing can take that away.

§•§

His little sister looks beautiful as the flower girl and though only he sees the silver eyes everyone can see how bright the grey is and she hums her way through the ceremony and though his Grandfather has narrowed eyes the entire time he barely objected when he was told because this was his grandson who's been through too much and Lily is a nice girl.

And even though it starts to rain part of the way through he doesn't mind because Lily is next to him and she's smiling in a white dress and after she holds him like she did once in the Hogwarts library and in her arms there is no pain.

And over her shoulder as she spreads the eyepatch over a chair he sees Sirius as he springs back to form and he realizes that maybe Lily did know he was there because he's only there when she believes in her Sight.

And in a room of soaked people, it's only them and silence.

* * *

Reviews are very welcome. I'm trying to improve my poetry, and even if you only write "This is good you should write like this more often!" it helps. (You can copy/paste that to save time if you want XD)


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